I always carry a small notebook with me and yesterday I went through several of them copying down information I wanted to keep into what I call my 'catch-all' notebook.

I came across a page or two I had written when my husband Barry was dying in February 2016. The idea of micri and megali came into play in that experience. I was focussed on being with him in the hospice and the minutiae of his care and the intensity of being totally in the moment. But on the way to and from the hospice which was a journey by car, bus and ferry, I was intensely conscious of the much much bigger picture - of our small place in the vastness of the universe. Here is what I wrote -

As Barry is dying I notice how brilliantly starry the nights are, how big the moon, how frosty the mornings, and how beautiful the dawns. I open the window to the night to hear with wonder the last melancholy trill of the curlew and the first cry of the owl. Early one morning I walk down the path to the water's edge and see the biggest flock of gulls I have ever seen rise into the air and cross the bay without their usual raucous cries but in utter silence except for the sound of hundreds and hundreds of wingbeats.

It was as if the tiny things, the micri, and the vast things, the megali, were heightened to an extreme - and the in between things hardly existed and were passing in a blur of sorrow and pain.

The nights are still starry, the mornings frosty and the dawns beautiful.

What strikes me Freda is that it was because you were so intensely present with the situation, that the only things that existed for you were the real things... The rest, the dream-world we usually inhabit was of no consequence. I think when we are faced with the rawness of life and don't turn away from it or block it out, it opens us... clears our vision.... everything unreal falls away and only what truly matters remains. Thank you for sharing the micri and the megali... Sending love and good wishes for your blog break xxx

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Madeleine

14/2/2018 02:19:54 am

Warmest wishes for a restorative break. Thank you for sharing your writing with us.

Madeleine.x

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Linda

14/2/2018 03:03:30 am

It's these times of hightened perception that we really remember. They seem to hit our brains in an intense way, and we notice those things that normally pass us by. For me, it's often smells, whether nice, nasty or musty.
It does make me think, though, how much we miss out on the rest of the time, when we are not paying attention.
Come back refreshed!

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Mary

14/2/2018 04:10:38 am

You captured Life in your brief paragraph -- all its beauty and all its pain.

Lifting you up this month. Know that you are in my thoughts. xo

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Julia

14/2/2018 04:16:42 am

freda.....mary oliver wrote a poem that reminds me of the intensity you describe here..the immediacy of each moment..and the meaning of each moment!! It is all too easy to get lost in the mundane of our lives. but the thought of losing our own life, or that of our beloved, brings the true preciousness of life into focus. Here is a link to the poem. Sending love....

https://www.loc.gov/poetry/180/102.html?loclr=lsp1_rg0001

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Gail

14/2/2018 04:34:21 am

Praying for true rest and whatever else you need dear lady

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Susan

14/2/2018 06:37:24 am

Sending love.

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Cristiana

14/2/2018 06:47:43 am

Thank you for sharing Freda.
We will be here.
With a warm virtual hug.

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Liz

14/2/2018 07:42:14 am

Absolutely beautiful. Try to listen to radio 4 Book of the Week about owls. It’s fascinating. 🦉

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Freda

16/2/2018 06:46:53 pm

Thank you - so enjoyed this.

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Liz

14/2/2018 07:44:57 am

Just remembered Mary Oliver’s poem, too, about a snowy owl ‘White Owl Flies in and out’. I can email it if you like.